During the darkest days of the Depression, when suicides from financial loses became common and jobs were non-existent, a baby girl named Irene Barr was born.

Irene came into the world with a condition called acrodynia that prevented her eyes from opening and affected her movement. It was expected that this little baby would not live. Distraught by the plight of his daughter’s illness, Irene’s father took her to see a faith healer and to her parents’ amazement, her eyes did open.

Doctors told her parents to take her to a river or lake and have her try swimming. This, they believed, would develop her weak muscles and improve her mobility. Every day the young child was placed on a raft by her older sister until finally, at the age of five, she kicked and paddled her way back to shore by herself.

Irene became a fixture at a local pool and her swimming became stronger. One day she was spotted by a swimming coach, who asked her to join the local club. Join she did, and by the time she was 13 she was asked to try out for a spot on the Olympic team. During four years of training, Irene broke every single Canadian record and earned her spot on the Olympic team along with the nickname, “The Iron Barr”.

Unfortunately this was also a time when humanity was facing a crisis that would change the history of the world forever. Dark days were approaching as Adolph Hitler gained power and a world war began to seem inevitable as trepidation grew about this sinister leader. On Irene’s birthday, Sept. 23, 1939, war was declared and the Olympics were cancelled.

Irene married Dennys Van Fleet, a Canadian sailor, and raised her family while working as a physical education teacher, a job she held for 19 years. Life was good, but Irene  never lost the feeling that something was missing.

She found the fulfillment she sought when she joined the Masters Swimming Club. When she was in her early 60s in the late 1980s, she heard about the World Games to be held in Denmark. Training as hard as she had back in the 1930s, and despite the fact that it was 50 years later and she was now a grandmother of three, Irene achieved swimming times almost identical to her past records.

She went on to the victory denied her all those years ago and won two gold and two silver medals and one bronze at the 1990 games. Today, Irene Van Fleet lives at Buckingham Manor in Stouffville and is a gracious and lovely woman who makes you proud to be Canadian.

At approximately 9 a.m. on Thursday, Dec. 17, the Olympic Torch will come through Stouffville on its journey to British Columbia for the Winter Games. You are invited to join Irene and Stouffville’s own Olympic Medalists, Karen Cockburn, Mathieu Turgeon and Mike Harris, along with local dignitaries at the Lebovic Centre for Arts and Entertainment – Nineteen on the Park.

Bring your pride in being a Canadian and your thanks for the efforts made by these special few who dedicated themselves to being the best in the world. 

Categories: Columns, Ramblin' Ruth
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